The Hopkins Diaspora ERG Celebrates 400 Years of African-American History in Maryland

1600

1619 In August 1619, a ship arrived in Point Comfort, Virginia, carrying more than 20 enslaved Africans, the first on record to be brought to the English colony of Virginia. They were among the 12.5 million Africans forced into the trans-Atlantic slave trade through the Middle Passage.

1634 Mathias de Sousa, the first black in Maryland, arrived aboard the Ark in St. Mary’s City.

1642 The first documented Africans were brought to Maryland in 1642, as 13 slaves arrived at St. Mary’s City.

1661 The Maryland Assembly passed a law forbidding miscegenation (interracial marriage). In 1664, the Maryland Assembly ruled that all enslaved people should be held in slavery for life and that children of enslaved mothers should also be held in slavery for life.

1700

1731 Benjamin Banneker was born in Baltimore County, Maryland. Banneker was a free black almanac author, surveyor of the District of Columbia, naturalist, and farmer.

1739 A conspiracy for the most massive slave revolt in America’s history was planned by Jack Ransom in Prince George’s County to include over 200 slaves with a target date of December 1, 1739. A loyal slave told his master of the plot, and Mr. Ransom, along with five other slaves, were arrested. Mr. Ransom was eventually hanged in March1740.

1792 Mr. Thomas Brown, a black Revolutionary War veteran from Baltimore, made an unsuccessful bid for a seat in the state legislature. 1800 1807 Ira Aldridge, a Shakespearean actor, was born in Harford County. The 1890 Henry Scythe Cummings was elected to the Baltimore City Council. Shakespearean Memorial Theater in Stratford-on-Avon in England has a chair designated in his memory. 1892 The Afro-American newspaper was founded. In 1896, John H. Murphy purchased the newspaper and ran the paper until his son, Carl Murphy, succeeded him as 1818 Frederick Douglass was born into slavery as Frederick Augustus Washington Bailey president in 1922. on the Eastern Shore of the Chesapeake Bay in Talbot County, Maryland. Douglas escaped from slavery on September 3, 1838, in Baltimore, Maryland, and later 1894 Provident Hospital was established in Baltimore by leading black physicians became a national leader of the abolitionist movement in Massachusetts and New in 1894. York.

1820 Harriet Tubman was born Araminta “Minty” Ross in Dorchester County, Maryland. 1900 She successfully escaped from slavery on September 17, 1849. Tubman returned to the Eastern Shore of Maryland through the Underground Railroad rescuing 1901 Through various means, including attempted amendments to the state constitution, over 70 slaves in 13 expeditions. Maryland tried to take the right to vote away from blacks. Though unsuccessful, attempts were not abandoned until the 1910s. 1831 A network of secret routes and safe houses used by black and white abolitionists 1908 Thurgood Marshall was born in Baltimore, Maryland. He served as Associate Justice to help black people escape from slavery, was officially named “The Underground of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1967 until 1991. Marshall was the Railroad.” Court’s 96th justice and its first African-American justice. Before his judicial service, 1831 Maryland responded to Nat Turner’s rebellion by drafting a new, more Marshall successfully argued several cases before the Supreme Court, including comprehensive law, further curtailing slaves’ privileges and usurping the rights Brown v. Board of Education. of free blacks. 1911 Clarence Maurice Mitchell, Jr. was born in Baltimore, Maryland. Mitchell was an 1835 Isaac Myers, a pioneer of the African-American trade union movement and American civil rights activist and was the regional director and chief lobbyist for the the first the first known African-American postal inspector, was born in Baltimore, NAACP for nearly 30 years. Maryland. 1930 Founded in the 1930s, Carr’s Beach and Sparrow’s Beach each attracted thousands 1863 The Emancipation Proclamation freed enslaved blacks on January 1, 1863. of African-Americans to the shores of the Chesapeake Bay just south of Annapolis. Carr’s Beach was a regular stop for famous entertainers such as Ray Charles, 1864 Slavery did not end in Maryland until the adoption of a new State Constitution on James Brown, and Sarah Vaughan. November 1, 1864. However, new state law allowed former slaveholders to force African-Americans under age 21 into “apprenticeship” if they had no other means 1935 A lawsuit required the University of Maryland School of Law, to admit its first black of support. students.

1870 African American men won the right to vote with the 15th amendment to the 1941 Dr. Vivien Thomas assisted Dr. Alfred Blalock at The Johns Hopkins Hospital and Constitution. In the same year, lawmakers in Maryland and many other states was instrumental in developing the life-saving cardiac surgical procedure for enacted property requirements for voters, barring all men without land from “blue” babies in 1944. He served as supervisor of the surgical laboratories at Johns voting. Few African-Americans owned farms or homes. Hopkins for 35 years.

1873 William H. Butler became the first black elected official in the state when he won a 1946 Dr. Ralph Jonathan Young was the first black physician appointed to The Johns seat on the Annapolis City Council in 1873. Hopkins Hospital medical staff.

1882 Joseph I. Collins was elected City Commissioner in Cambridge, Dorchester 1954 Baltimore became the first city in Maryland and the first in the nation to implement County, Maryland. school desegregation following Brown v. Board of Education. 1889 Mr. William Thomas, the beloved and much-admired doorman, opened the doors 1958 Verda Welcome was elected to the Maryland House of Delegates to represent of The Johns Hopkins Hospital to receive its first visitors on May 7. He remained the Fourth District of Baltimore City, becoming the first black woman to be at Hopkins for 59 years until his death in 1948. elected to a state senate.

1889 Mr. Benjamin Frisby was a porter at The Johns Hopkins Hospital and started the 1959 Ms. Gertrude Hodges was the first African-American to graduate from The Johns annual Turtle Derby and the Frisby Farm. He later became a messenger to the Hopkins Training School for Nurses. superintendent of JHH. 1965 The U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Robert M. Bell v. The State of Maryland outlawed discrimination in Maryland restaurants and public accommodations.

1971 Parren J. Mitchell became the first African-American from Maryland elected to the U.S. Congress. He served from 1971 – 1987.

1971 Dr. Levi Watkins began his medical residency at The Johns Hopkins Hospital. He later became chief resident of cardiac surgery and the first African-American chief resident at JHU.

1973 Dr. Franklin W. Knight was the first African-American faculty member to gain academic tenure at Johns Hopkins University.

1978 Dr. Roland T. Smoot became the first African-American faculty member and assistant dean at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine.

1984 Dr. Ben Carson was appointed Director of Pediatric Neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins, and in 1987, was the lead neurosurgeon of a 70-member surgical team that separated conjoined twins.

1987 Clarence “Du” Burns was appointed as Mayor of Baltimore for half a term. However, Kurt L. Schmoke became Baltimore’s first African-American elected mayor in 1987.

1990 Michael Moore became the first African-American elected county legislator in Calvert County.

1999 Gwendolyn Parrish became the first African-American woman on motorcycle patrol and to rise to the rank of Sergeant in the Baltimore County Police Department.

2000 2002 Michael S. Steele, lieutenant governor of Maryland from 2003 - 2007, was the first African-American elected to a statewide office.

2007 Shelia Dixon became the first African-American woman to serve as president of the Baltimore City Council and Baltimore’s first female Mayor.

2007 Fannie Gaston-Johansson was the first African-American woman to be a tenured full professor at Johns Hopkins University. She was also named the first chair of the School of Nursing Department of Acute and Chronic Care.

2007 Dr. Lisa Cooper was the first African-American woman to become a tenured professor in the School of Medicine at Johns Hopkins University.

2018 Lt. Col. LaTonya Lewis became the first African-American woman to rise above the rank of lieutenant in the Baltimore City Police Department.

2019 Dr. Sherita Golden becomes the first African-American woman to serve as Chief Diversity Officer at Johns Hopkins Medicine.

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